


And Spill the Things I Mean to Hide Away

by eudaimon



Category: The Paradise
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-20
Updated: 2012-12-20
Packaged: 2017-11-21 19:25:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,066
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/601251
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eudaimon/pseuds/eudaimon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Denise always knew that she would be successful in her own right; ultimately, that ust meant that she was the one who had to learn how to be cold.</p>
            </blockquote>





	And Spill the Things I Mean to Hide Away

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Maidenjedi](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Maidenjedi/gifts).



> Happy Yuletide! I really hope that you enjoy this take on Denise - I really loved your prompt for exploring what happened and whether she got her own shop.
> 
> Title from "Sounds Familiar" by the Weakerthans
> 
> ♥

And, perhaps, it’s inevitable that the world should change, but not too much. Enough to let her have her own store – her own little piece of Paradise. But not nearly enough for other things, in the end. Never enough. Often, Denise reflects that the world is like an engine, ever moving forward but it all it takes is one piece out of place for the whole bloody thing to grind to a halt. And that’s what they were, wasn’t it? In the middle of all of that wedding planning, all of the to-ing and fro-ing and things that they should never, ever have done, there they were. 

Him and her, the two of them - pieces out of place.

She does think of that kiss often. Because it was lovely, wasn’t it? Even if it wasn’t meant to be. Moray couldn’t help it – he had a romantic heart – and so, afterwards, it had fallen to Denise to be the pragmatic one, to figure out how to be cold. Some women have lockets for their sweethearts; Denise has the memory of that one kiss, that sweet and perfect moment before the world caught up with them again.

Which the world is wont to do, because the world is hungry. And cruel. You have to stay one step ahead if you do not wish to be swallowed whole. Denise thinks, perhaps, that that’s something that Moray never really understood (though he clearly thought that he did) - there was always a touch of whimsy about him; a hopefulness that Denise couldn’t feel, not when she’d come from where she’d come from and fought so hard. Not when she’d seen that very particular look come into her uncle’s eyes during those weeks when nobody was buying new dresses or new ribbons for their hair. Yes, at the time, as a girl, she was besotted with him, with John Moray, but now she thinks of him in less generous terms. Sometimes. 

_I was born in the dark_ , she thinks, _and I was born hungrier than you._

Her store is no ‘Paradise’, but it does have the virtue of being entirely hers. Three storeys, narrower than the Paradise, a slice of the block at the corner of Corporation Street and New Street. Birmingham is a city not unlike the one she left behind: loud, brash and busy. It feels like the kind of city that could swallow a person whole, but Denise has no intention of disappearing. If Moray can do it, with his easily turned head, then she can too. She is not a silly girl. Not a pushover or a fly-by-night. She knows the way that women think and, more importantly, she knows the way they _shop_. She might not have the floor-space, but she has Ladies Wear and Haberdashery, racks of ribbons and rolls of lace; she has personally made journeys to Istanbul and Burano, Murano (on Torcello and she stopped and lit a candle for the girls that she used to know. Because every girl could use a candle lit for her, from time to time. Because there is nothing wrong with a little bit of light in all of the world’s dark).

*

Her favourite time is after closing, when the girls have gone home (nowhere to sleep under this roof except for her apartment – she reminds herself of Miss Audrey, some days) and the shop floor is quiet and tidy and still. She walks a set path, between the glass-topped counters and the mannequins dressed in the latest fashions. Trailing her fingers against fabric, gloveless to feel the shifts in textures. Sometimes, she dreams about minutiae, the littlest, tiniest things – she wakes up and realises that she was dreaming about the exact weight and feel of the fabric of the dresses that the girls of the Paradise wore. Her girls do not wear heavy black; each one wears a different coloured silk and, together, they look like jewels, or a flock of exotic birds. Her girls smile often and make conversation – they are trained to make every woman feel like she is the only woman who could ever matter.

Because Denise knows that, for most women, buying beautiful things has at least a little bit to do with escape.

The last thing she does at night is light a candle on the window sill. It feels like she’s got a lot to be thankful for. It feels like she’s got everything to remember.

*

They come, from time to time, still – always in a plain white envelope, addressed in a sloped, romantic hand Even his handwriting has whimsy. It’s like he does it on purpose; every last inch of him was created, built from the ground up, and he is exactly how he means to be, in every small, infuriating detail.

She saves the letters, though. She waits for them. They always show up when she least expects it.

And there he is, waiting. In every word.

*

_My dearest Denise,_

_I hope that this letter finds you in good health and good cheer. How is business down in Birmingham? As always, as ever, the Paradise misses you deeply. We have never been quite the same since you left us. Audrey mentions you often – I imagine that you can well picture the kinds of things that she says._

_I truly do hope that you are well, Denise. You are often on my mind._

_Katherine sends her love (or, I’m sure she would, if she knew about these letters at all). Is it cruel of me to mention her, I wonder? Do you still think about it, Denise. Do you give it any thought at all? I suppose you must not. You haven’t been to see us in years and I hear that your store does well for you. I do not mean to sound bitter, Denise – what will be will be – but I cannot help but wish that things had turned out differently._

_I cannot help but wish._

\- JM

*

She reads it more than once, looking for ever flicker of meaning that she can find. Between every line, all that she can see is _here are things I meant to hide away, but can’t._ So many words an all of them mean _but you must know_.

And she does. She has.  
That was kiss was lovely, but it was only a moment. How to tell him, then, that moments end?


End file.
